I saw the Diamondbacks as a team essentially moving in the right direction even if I did not necessarily agree with some of their trades and payroll decisions. For instance, I though investing in Yasmany Tomas was foolish and I have doubts he will live up to his potential nor does he have a position he can adequately defend. I think the Rays will also regret trading Touki Toussaint just for payroll relief.
My main goal of the project was to dump some unnecessary payroll and add competent veteran pitching. I was unsuccessful in dumping the salaries of Aaron Hill even with Tomas offered as a sweetener. Thus, I was unable to go all out to get one of the best arms available. Instead, I traded Patrick Corbin for Jaime Garcia who I believe will be a solid upgrade despite his past health issues, and receiving talented outfield prospect Nick Plumber. I also invested 12 million in veteran R.A. Dickey who looked extremely good in the second half of the 2015 season. He has proven if nothing else to be fearless at the top of a rotation and a great innings eater.
It was my hope that the veteran pitching would help the team in multiple ways. I wanted leaders on the pitching staff that could give our talented core of young arms a mentor and someone to emulate in work and preparation habits. Not to mention win more of the games that our talented offense deserved in 2015. I tried to add to the bullpen but salary restrictions made that difficult to accomplish. The good news is there should be plenty of salary space for in-season additions. I think this team can compete in the NL West.
Non-Tendered: Jeremy Hellickson 6.6M, Ruby De La Rosa 3.2M
Non-Roster Invites: RP Kevin Jepsen, RP Alexi Ogando, RP Tanner Scheppers
Traded: Patrick Corbin 2.3M
Top Prospects : CF Socrates Brito, SP Aaron Blair, 2B Brandon Drury, SP Braden Shipley, OF Nick Plumber
25-Man Roster
C Wellington Castillo 3.6M
1B Paul Goldschmidt 5.75M
2B Aaron Hill 12M
3B Jake Lamb
SS Nick Ahmed
LF Yasmany Tomas 4M
CF A.J. Pollock 4.3M
RF David Peralta
Bench
C Tuffy Gosewisch
OF Ender Inciarte
OF Peter O’Brien
MI Chris Owings
2B/3B Phil Gosselin
C Oscar Hernandez
Rotation
1. R.A. Dickey 12M
2. Jaime Garcia 11M
3. Robbie Ray
4. Archie Bradley
5. Josh Collmenter 1.825M
Bullpen
Silvino Bracho
Brad Ziegler 5.5M
Daniel Hudson 2.0M
Jhoulys Chacin 1.8M
Matt Reynolds .8M
Randall Delgado 1.0M